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The Art Of Improvisation

Recently, I watched The Art of Improvisation, a 2005 documentary about pianist and composer Keith Jarrett. You may know Jarrett’s 1975 recording, The Köln Concert, as the best-selling solo album in jazz history. But what I was struck with while hearing his thoughts — of course — was how similar his description of jazz improvisation was to writing: the mindset, the elements, and the contours. By the end of this documentary, I was convinced that every time we sit down to write, we are, in fact, improvising.

Specifically, some of my takeaways from the film:
  • It is impossible to predict what will happen in improvisation; you just put your nervous system on alert for every single thing.
  • You sort out your materials in real time, approaching them as naturally as you approach your own breath.
  • A concrete thought process and an intuitive process can happen at the same time.
  • First the music enters you, then you don’t have to worry about what to play; the music’s telling you what to play.
  • When you allow everything to come through you, it will reach a kind of choke point when it has to come out of you. And if you don’t make a sound after that, you never will.
  • You find a way to get the best possible sound of your instrument.
  • The familiar routines of life are in complete contrast with the risks you take when you improvise; with improvisation, you begin every time with a blank slate.
  • The more experience a person has, the simpler they can sound; timing is the key to simplicity.
  • You have to take your whole being along with you. Then the soul shines through because things are always new.
When Jarrett joined Miles Davis’ band in the early 1970s, Miles said he wanted him to approach their performances as if he’d never played music before. It takes courage not to prefigure your results; it can feel risky to not have a specific goal. But it is also so refreshing to get into the work this way, and continue to work your way into it slowly. Do you have thoughts on how improvisation relates to other areas of life?

Doctorow’s Headlights

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about the novelist E.L. Doctorow’s quote in the Paris Review Writers at Work (2nd) series. You may have heard it:

“Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”

I believe this; I really do. But still I struggle, writing a book on a deadline, when I extrapolate my current word count and it inevitably falls short of what my contract stipulates. I experience anxiety over not being able to see the make-up of each and every chapter clearly from where I sit today. And behind all of that is the concern that, while I like what I have done so far, that is no guarantee that I will continue producing at a high level.

Rather than make myself falsely feel better, which will only be a temporary solution, I find myself going back to the quote and asking it questions.

If that is true, then I should implicitly only worry about what my headlights illuminate, right? So, it is okay to write Chapter 8, and then Chapter 4, Chapter 3, the Introduction, and so forth?

And if I do that, can I truly rely on the Book Architecture Method concept of series to help me keep track of what I have written about, what still needs to be seeded, and what needs to be concluded?

And if I stay committed to this approach, is it okay, natural even, when one chapter splits into two, and the 33 ideas I have here go with one grouping, and these 15 ideas go with another? And then I can complete this chapter that uses those 33 ideas as their base, and assume that the one with 15 ideas will grow under the approaching headlights the same way all of the other chapters have grown?

Then my obsession with surety always comes back; it seems the best I can do is alternate belief and doubt. I re-read the quote and ask: What if we’re on the wrong road, though? I spread the paper map out on my knee while I am driving, which if you didn’t come of age during the era of paper maps, is not only dangerous, but you end up missing the clues of where the road winds and dips ahead. Are you sure these high beams are on?

There seem to be two options: self-torture or faith. 

If I choose self-torture, the activities seem pretty clear. I will measure and stress over quantity and pace. I will grasp for ideas whose time has not yet come. I will try to get some unsuspecting beta reader to make me feel better about my progress and eventual destination, etc.

If I choose faith, there doesn’t seem to be much more to it than this: Sink into the work. Do I know what I’m working on Tuesday? Do I have a process to capture what announces itself then over the horizon so I know what I’m working on Wednesday? If so, I have everything I need.

Maybe this is why the novelist Ernest Hemingway praised incremental progress:

“The best way is always to stop when you are going good and when you know what will happen next. If you do that every day when you are writing a novel you will never be stuck. That is the most valuable thing I can tell you so try to remember it.”

Meaning, if you can see this swath of highway, you’re good. And what’s more, once you get a glimpse of the next stretch, you should save it for tomorrow as a way of avoiding writer’s block.

Some days, it all makes sense. One those days I might remember another quote, this one from Japanese Zen Master Shunryu Suzuki:

“Your way is to kill two birds with one stone. Our way is just to kill one bird with one stone.”



Writing The Things You Think You Cannot Say

The inaugural Understory Writers Conference was held last month in Park City, Utah under the sparkling leadership of Annie Tucker. I presented four workshops, including The Book Architecture Method, Meditation for Writers, Editing and Self-Editing…and honestly would like to do it again next week.

But the best one—either because it is the newest, or because it is the topic I am so engaged with right now because of my own book, or because it was the juiciest/most revelatory—was: Writing the Things You Think You Cannot Say. (Which could have been called Dealing With Unspeakable Material In Your Memoir and The People Who Don’t Want You To Speak It.)

After the conference, a number of attendees reached out to express their chagrin they had missed that particular session. And so we are going to put it on again, live on Zoom, on October 14th at 10am Pacific.

In this 60 minute session, we will cover:

  • The gory, vengeful first draft
  • A process to determine what you need as opposed to being guided solely by righteous indignation
  • Libel
  • People you still want to have Thanksgiving with
  • Karma

You know if you need to be there. The cost is free. Email me here so we can make sure you get all the details.

The BA Band: Nick Mullendore

Madison Utley speaks to Nick Mullendore, the agent responsible for getting Amnesty Day out into the world. Nick is the founder and president of the Vertical Ink Agency, which he established in 2016, and he is also a co-owner and the managing partner of Loretta Barrett Books.

MU: To start, let’s talk about how you took Stuart’s project on and then helped him reshape it into something you thought would sell. How did you develop that hands-on approach?

NM: I started working at an agency in 1998, Loretta Barrett Books. Loretta Barrett, the founder, was very hands-on. She had been an editor and publisher herself for many, many years, so she did a lot of development. I learned from her to put in the work to make something as strong as it can possibly be before shipping it off to publishers–and the need to do that has only become more essential over the years as the industry has expanded and the competition has intensified.

MU: Stuart’s project came to you in 2022 and sold in 2025. What sustained your efforts to get it into the right hands throughout that time? 

NM: I don’t take things on unless I believe in them, unless I feel a connection to them, I feel that I understand them, I think they have merit. Amnesty Day was certainly all of those things. It was a very strong concept from a very high-level writer with a platform and lots of ways to promote. It has so many elements I expect people to gravitate toward, and I really do think it’s a book that will start conversations about different ways to approach parenting and family dynamics. 

I believed that eventually we’d find somebody that would get it and see what we saw in it–and we are grateful that we did. It was one of the bigger shocks in recent years for me that somebody didn’t jump on this much sooner. But it came down to having confidence in my taste and my vision, along with my author’s work and vision, and in what the book can and should do when it’s published.

MU: Earlier you alluded to changes in the publishing industry you’ve witnessed over your time as an agent. Can you expound on that?

NM: It’s very hard to get a [nonfiction] book published right now–and it’s just getting harder and harder. All of the resources are going to celebrities and big platform authors that have TikToks or podcasts or television shows. If you don’t have that, publishers aren’t giving you a chance very often anymore. That’s just the truth. 

Developing a platform has pretty much become the most important thing – for nonfiction especially, but even for fiction writers, a platform of some sort is a big advantage over most other novelists. Authors hate to hear they have to do it. Everybody wants it to be about the purity of the writing and the art. And it is about that, but it is also about learning the business of publishing, and right now, that means being creative about how you can develop your own platform and profile. If you’re not sure where to start, look to develop community: join writers groups, become active in the literature scene wherever you are, get out there and meet people who are also writing and networking. Becoming savvy about how publishing works is a real leg up for any author who is serious about trying to do this for a living.  

MU: Is there anything specific you’re hoping comes across your desk sometime soon, manuscript wise? 

NM: No. I’m interested in a lot of different things because a lot of different things are interesting. But generally, I do much more nonfiction than fiction because it’s more quantifiable. With fiction, you’re just at the whim of personal taste so often. With nonfiction, you know where to go and how to present it. With a strong proposal and a few sample chapters, you can sell a project rather than needing to have a whole novel written. 

Also my own taste has come more to the fore in my agency, Vertical Ink, which is a little more punk rock, a little edgier than what I typically worked on at Loretta Barrett Books. So now I’m guided both by what I already knew how to do well as I gained experience in the industry along with where my personal taste takes me.